I should probably mention that today is the release of my novel
Good to the Last Drop
Here's chapter 4, though.
Chapter
4: The Trap
January
2nd,
San Francisco
Marco
Catalano, being unusually stubborn for someone who was both male and
only partly Irish, walked through the evening, looking around the
crypts of San Francisco to see if there was anything that didn’t
know well enough to stay dead. In
the back of his head,
instead of a casual prayer,
he had started going through a rock rendition of the Our Father, in
German. It was a good tune to have while hunting.
Because
Gregorian chant is not something I want to hunt vampires to.
“Marco.”
He
turned and looked at the new girl—Jackie. “Hi there.” He looked
her over and sighed. “You look quite nice this evening.” He
glanced at his watch. “Or should I say morning?”
She
shrugged. “Just call it ‘late.’
What are you doing out?”
He
looked out at the dark of Grant Street in Chinatown—he was in
between cemeteries at the moment. “Hunting, or going for a walk.
Something like that.”
“Oh.
Mind if I join you?”
“Sure,
I might as well be falling apart.”
They
continued to walk down the street of the opulent neighborhood until
they reached the docks along Fisherman’s Wharf. The skyline of the
next city glowed in the not too distant horizon, along with a harbor
cruise ship that was traveling around the bay with its continuously
partying passengers. This view was lost on the two patrollers, mainly
because all they saw was two women about to be sucked dry.
Two
targets were good for the concentration.
“I’ll
go for the one on the left, you the right. Sound good to you?”
Marco looked over at Jackie to see whether she agreed, and found the
space where she had been standing empty. He looked up to see her
going at it with the two vampires.
Marco
sighed. “Or we can just charge into the fight without thinking.
That’s a classic.”
Marco
pulled out a turpentine-soaked stake and headed after the newbie. One
of the melodramatically-dressed
Goth vampires saw him coming and charged head on, letting out a
stereotypical horrid hiss. He briefly considered stapling the vamp’s
hand to his forehead. His angst would send him to dust more quickly.
“Dress
normally, would you?” Marco growled, dodging to the right. “This
isn’t a game.” Marco rammed the stake home as though he were
clothes-lining the vampire.
Marco
plucked the stake out, and placed it back in his belt as the vampire
turned into dust. “Waste not, want not.”
Marco
looked over to see Jackie being backed up against the railing by the
other equally-overdressed vampire. He was about to go and help her,
when he took a second look. He knew he didn’t need glasses, yet he
could swear he saw a look of enjoyment
on the young woman’s face.
Marco
rolled his eyes. Yana had spent weeks fretting over how scary he was,
and she had managed to hook up with a girl who seemed to enjoy
killing the damned as much as he did.
Without
hesitation, she leaped on the vampire, grabbed his head, and started
making out with him… it seemed. She was actually spitting water
into his mouth.
The
vampire pushed her away and dropped to his knees, grabbing his throat
as it disappeared under his fingers. Jackie smiled as his neck
collapsed in on itself, along with the rest of his body. He then
turned into dust, spilling into the breeze and blowing all over her
hands, clothes, face, and hair.
“Poor
baby, can’t handle his drink.”
Jackie
stood, faced away from the dust and took a deep breath, exhaling a
deep sigh of satisfaction. She faced Marco, who still stood at a
distance.
Pity,
I get ready to leave, I get someone on the team who might be
interesting.
“Too
much?” she asked, sounding surprisingly innocent for someone who
had basically poured acid down his throat. But still, she was pretty
nonchalant.
Jackie
laughed and gave him a smile. Even from where he stood he could see
her eyes dancing in the dim street light with the satisfaction of the
kill. He found himself staring – he wasn’t used to being on the
other side of that. “Let’s get you home.”
“Why?”
she protested.
Marco
laughed. “I know you seem to be enjoying yourself, but as you can
see…” He held up his watch. It was two hours to sunup.
Jackie
sighed and replaced the holy water flask on her hip. “Suppose I
can’t continue hunting when the sun is out.”
“Not
unless you have a ready answer
for
why you’re walking around with sharp pointy things in San
Francisco.”
The
two exchanged a look of amusement. They both knew that technically,
they could go hunting in the daytime, but neither was up to the job
of explaining why they were kicking open random crypt doors, looking
inside for a few seconds, and then closing the door as if nothing had
happened.
Jackie
offered her hand. “It
was nice meeting you.”
Marco
walked up and yet again took her hand. “And where do you think
you’re going?”
A
slight sense of alarm took over Jackie. “I’m going home.” She
pointed over her shoulder. “I was planning to walk down Grant.”
He
gave her and incredulous look. “Uh huh. And then what?”
As
she gave her answer, she realized how ridiculous it sounded. “Walk
halfway across town.” She looked up at him and offered an
embarrassed grin. He sighed, and walked over with her to the curbside
edge.
“Where
exactly are you taking me?”
“I’m
going to put you in a cab and send you home. And if you even think of
paying the fare, I’ll break your arm off here and now.”
This
stunned Jackie and allowed Marco to lead her along. She never
heard
someone force
chivalry on another, and threaten them if they tried otherwise. She
was quickly seeing
that this guy Marco was completely, utterly, undeniably…nuts.
They
reached
a major street and Marco waved down a cab. The foreign driver rolled
down his window and asked with a surprising lack of accent, “Where
to?”
Marco
looked over at Jackie, who was still dumbfounded by threatening
kindness. “You need me to check your wallet for you?” he asked, a
slight tone of impatience coming through.
He
shook his head and gave the driver Yana’s address. “All right
then.” She watched Marco as he opened the door for her. “In you
go.”
Jackie
walked around and stepped into the cab, looking back up at him. “You
know you don’t have to do this. I can handle the—”
He
cut her off. “Do you think I was kidding about breaking your arm?”
She
stopped
mid-sentence and just blankly stared at him. “Get in the cab.”
Without
reaction from her, he placed her hand at her side and closed the
door. He looked at the driver. “So how much is the damage?”
The
cabby looked back at her, still a bit dumbstruck, and replied, “For
her? Twenty.” Marco reached into his back pocket, pulled out a
relatively small wad of twenties and handed one to him.
Before
the driver took off, Marco called his attention again. “By the way?
If you try anything, just remember I have your license plate
memorized, and have no qualms about hunting you down and treating you
with the same loving care that a white supremacist would have with
you and yours. Am I understood?”
A
look of pure horror emerged on the driver’s face as he mechanically
nodded his agreement. “Good.” Marco pounded on the roof of the
cab. “Tally-ho then.”
*
* * *
“Marco!”
a voice snapped at him in the middle of the night. “Get up!”
His
eyes snapped open. Yana was at his bedside. How
did that happen?
“We
need to go, now!”
Marco
kicked the covers off and rolled off the bed, onto his feet, still
fully dressed, with a knife in his hand. “What is it?”
Yana
looked over her shoulder. “No time, we have to go, now!”
He
stopped, glanced at the door, fully locked and bolted. “Well,
whatever you are, you’re not omniscient. At
least
there’s
that much.”
He
looked over his shoulder and launched a side kick, his foot going
through Yana’s chest, like a hologram. He smiled broadly as he
pulled his leg back. “I didn’t know vampires could have astral
projection. Or are you a ghost?”
The
projected image of Yana smiled, speaking now with a slight Russian
accent. “Glad to meet you, Marco. I’ve had my eye on you ever
since you killed my brother.”
Marco
winced, taken aback for a moment. A Russian accent meant a Russian
vampire, and there was only one other Russian vampire that he knew
outside of Amanda, and he had been killed in Brooklyn the year
before. Which meant…
Marco
smiled drolly. “Yes, your brother Mikhail. I hate to point out that
Nuala
killed
him.” He raised a brow. “Let me guess, either you’re outside,
or you have minions waiting? How absolutely cliché. Hell, you’re
his vengeful brother, should I assume you’re a twin?”
The
Yana image gave him Yana’s puppy-dog eyes and innocently asked,
“Why would I have any minions?”
Marco
backed up onto his bed. “You couldn’t count on me being
cooperative enough to leave my room, and you can’t get in without
an invite. You’d have them because I’m a scary bastard, otherwise
why waste a demon and an assassin on me? I’m honored that the
Council still thinks I’m a threat.”
“Yana”
raised a brow. “Threat? To me?”
The
New Yorker’s eyes narrowed. The vampire didn’t contradict Marco’s
statement about the Council, so that confirmed his supposition. The
image didn’t say us,
but me—which
gave Marco a guess that the Council had only the one vampire left to
go. “I
know that you can be beaten. Otherwise,
you’d
just come out and strike. That you’re resorting to, well, this,
means you want to
wear
us down, so you can kill us.”
“Let’s
find out,” the fake Yana said. “You’ve said you are what you’re
needed to be. Well, I need you dead!”
An
ax hit the door.
